


An Immediate Threat

by Nevcolleil



Series: Scenes from Central City High [2]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-10
Updated: 2015-03-10
Packaged: 2018-03-17 07:00:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3519761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nevcolleil/pseuds/Nevcolleil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dating the captain of his school's hockey team - not to mention a <i>badass</i> like Leonard Snart, on and off the ice - gives Barry street cred that even being the son of a cop hadn't given him before. Len presents an immediate threat that even guys like Tony usually respect.</p><p>'Usually' being the operative word, unfortunately.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Immediate Threat

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DoreyG](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/gifts).



Barry Allen is no stranger to getting beat up.

Before Barry sprung into one of the tallest kids in his class, it happened all the time... And even after that, Barry was still too skinny, too smart - too _smart-mouthed_ , apparently - and too kind to use his height to his advantage. So he continued to get beat up - _a lot_.

It's been better since Barry met Len. (Dating the captain of his school's hockey team - not to mention a _badass_ like Leonard Snart, on and off the ice - gives Barry street cred that even being the son of a cop hadn't given him before.) But Barry's never really forgotten.

Guys like Tony Woodward don't care about cops. Tony was probably born assuming he'd serve time for something, someday, but Len presents an immediate threat that even guys like Tony usually respect.

'Usually' being the operative word, unfortunately.

The third blow hits Barry in the face, and Barry moves with long-ago experience, so that Tony's fist connects with the corner of his mouth instead of busting both his lips and maybe even knocking loose some of his teeth. 

Barry takes a moment to spit out a mouthful of blood, and Tony punches him again in the stomach.

Barry groans and finally goes down.

Barry is no pushover - he fought back. The skin over the knuckles of both his hands is busted from fighting; Tony's right eye isn't necessarily black, but it's a little puffy, and there's a patch of red on one side of his jaw that might actually darken into a bruise. 

But now Barry can only hope he lives to see it as Tony sneers down at him and cracks his fists, an ugly pleasure in his eyes that makes Barry want to throw up like even Tony's massive fists didn't.

"Yeah, being Snart's bitch don't do you any good when he's not here to protect your skinny ass, does it, Allen?" Tony crows.

A loud, angry - almost bull-like - _growl_ interrupts just when Tony lifts one heavy, booted foot and Barry's body starts to curl in on itself, his arms folding around his head.

That's all the warning either of them get before the angry mass that is Mick Rory's body barrels into Tony like a freight train flown off its rails.

"Mick..." Mick is an enforcer on the hockey team - and Leonard's best friend. For a moment, Barry is too stunned to do anything but watch him straddle Tony's waist and pump his arms downward, into Tony's face and chest, like he's pounding meat, not another teenaged boy. 

Then Barry snaps out of it and scrambles to their side. " _Mick!_ Stop!"

He only has to ask once, and Mick rolls off of Tony. Barry's almost afraid to look behind him, at what he's sure will be a bloody mess where Tony Woodward's face should be - even though he can hear Tony moaning and cursing through his busted lips.

Mick went easy on him. As soon as Mick pulls away, Tony crawls onto his feet and _flees_ across the parking lot in the direction he came at Barry from.

"Yeah, you better run!" Mick calls after his retreating form, tacking on a word that Barry won't even _think_ , because if Iris ever caught him saying it...

"Holy _shit_. Mick-" Barry manages, as best as can without having fully recovered his breath. And then his phone is ringing before he's decided whether he's about to thank Mick for playing his white knight, or freak out about how badly he'd attacked Tony in retribution. (Probably both.)

With shaky hands, Barry fumbles his iPhone, out of the pocket of his jeans, where it has miraculously survived, to see that artsy, black and white close-up he took of Len for a project in his photography class. Leonard's name is lit up beneath it.

Barry's thumb is just covering the connect button when Mick startles him with an urgent, almost angry, " _Hey_! Don't do that!" 

He grabs Barry by the wrist, _hard_ , as he says it, and Barry gapes, barely resisting the urge for fight or flight for the second time in one night.

Mick blinks and pulls his hand back, wincing as if in apology, but he's still looking at Barry with a scowl as he demands, "Is that Len?"

Barry doesn't know what he's done wrong - he hadn't done _anything_ to Tony. And he's not sure why Mick would care if he had. If he's pissed at Barry for having had to come to his rescue, then why had he bothered? Barry just nods.

"Fuck. Don't answer it then."

" _What_? Why?"

"Are you kidding me?" Mick asks, like he honest-to-god thinks _Barry_ is the one who's talking crazy. "You're gonna talk to him with your voice still all raspy and shit? Calm down. We'll get you cleaned up, then we'll call him."

Maybe Tony hit Barry harder than Barry thought, because Barry has no idea what's going on - or why Mick Rory, who Barry has never seen scared before, suddenly seems totally unsettled. Barry almost casts a wary glance around them, like Tony might have friends that only Mick can see approaching.

Then Mick explains it to him. 

"Christ, kid, do you know what Len'd do if he could hear how shaken you are right now?" Mick begins. "If he saw you with _blood on your face?_ Fuck! Woodward'd be good as dead."

And suddenly Barry sees how it all makes sense. Mick isn't afraid of someone, or for Barry... He's afraid for _Len_. _Terrified_ , even.

"You might as well call Iron Heights and tell 'em to fix up his daddy's old cell," Mick says, visibly swallowing, "cause if he sees you like this before we can talk him down, he's gonna kill that little prick. I'm not exaggerating."

That is... not actually surprising, once Barry thinks about it - and neither is Mick's almost panicked knee-jerk move to protect Len from himself, but it puts a knot in Barry's throat, and makes him feel that much closer to the big, gruff senior, all the same. Barry shoves his phone back into his pocket and nods.

"Come on," Mick tells him, still apologizing in the slightly softer tone than he usually uses with Barry - almost as soft as the one Barry's heard when he's walked up on Len and Mick having a serious discussion and Mick hadn't yet seen him. 

'Public brawling and breaking an entering,' Barry thinks to himself, after Mick breaks them into the gym so Barry can use a sink in the boys' lockerroom. 'Joe would be so proud.'

But Barry can't really distract himself from the indisputable _weird_ that is Mick Rory being anything towards him besides indifferent or cautiously polite.

Mick even wets a short stack of papertowels for Barry, and when Barry only manages to reopen the split at the corner of his lips by rubbing at it, he grabs them back and says, "Careful! Here, let me."

He's hardly a nurse. Barry's chin has basically gone numb by the time Mick's through cleaning him up, because of how tight Mick held it as he worked, but Barry isn't bleeding anymore - and looks more or less like he never did - which is the actual point.

Mick drives them over to Len's place _only_ after he's deemed Barry calm enough not to set Len off, clean-faced or no (and Barry rolls his eyes, but he's smiling too.)

Just before Barry climbs out of the Lincoln, Mick grabs by the wrist again - obviously taking care this time not to grab too hard. It's been an odd night, so nothing would really surprise Barry, but it's still at least a little disorienting when Mick looks downright _nervous_ as he rubs the back of his neck with his free hand and says, "Hey... You get that I wasn't mad at you back there, right? I didn't mean to yell at 'ya so much."

"Yeah, yeah, I get it," Barry is quick to say. And he smiles, for the probably the first time ever at Mick. He likes the idea that tonight might be a turning point for them - that they could possibly be friends instead of separate counterpoints to Leonard with similar purposes. But he gets that everything tonight - the flying tackle, the Florence Nightingale routine, the almost anxious look now in Mick's eyes - are all about Len. 

And Barry is more than okay with that. 

He means it when he says, "Thanks. You know, for looking out. For Len."

The corner of Mick's lips quirk up in the closest thing to a smile that he's ever flashed at Barry as well. "I've been doing it for a long time, kid."

And as shitty as Barry feels right now, physically, (he feels sorta like _he_ was hit by a train) it's nice to be reminded that somebody has been. That Len has Mick, and an overprotective sister of his own. Sometimes, after everybody Barry knows (and a few people he doesn't) have made a day out of trying to warn him away from his moody boyfriend, Barry feels like he may be the only person in the world who sees Len for what he's really worth.

Not that Len makes it easy to defend him.

Barry runs his tongue over the split in his lips and says, "He's still gonna want to kill Tony, isn't he?"

Mick's half-smile breaks out in a grin. "Oh, yeah. But we can probably talk him into just maiming him instead."


End file.
